We missed this earlier: Acknowledging the threat to children’s right to privacy when asked to provide Aadhaar details during admission, the Delhi High Court on September 13 upheld the decision of a single judge to stay two Delhi government circulars mandating such practices for EWS/DG/CWSN category children. Delhi government’s circulars mandating Aadhaar for admission: Earlier, the Delhi government issued circulars that required children's Aadhaar card or number for admission to private unaided recognized schools under the Economically Weaker Sections (EWS)/Disadvantaged Group(DG)/Children With Special Needs (CWSN) category. Following this circular, a 5-year-old’s father in Delhi filed a plea challenging the document, alleging his child could not participate in a computerised government lottery scheme for allocation of seats in schools due to lack of Aadhaar details. The single judge had ordered a stay on the circulars based on this plea. Obtaining a child’s personal details infringes on privacy: Although the Delhi government appealed against the stay, Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Sanjeev Narula upheld the decision. “The view taken by learned Single Judge is completely in consonance with the judgment of Supreme Court in K.S. Puttaswamy (Supra), relevant portions whereof has been extracted in the impugned order. The issue of obtaining sensitive personal details of a child, as observed in K.S. Puttaswamy case, would have the potential of infringing their right to privacy under Article 21 of the Constitution of India. It would thus suffice to state that the impugned Circulars are prima facie in conflict with the constitutional provisions,…
